Our Work

Civic Edge Consulting was founded in 2003 as Barbary Coast Consulting. Since that time we have continued to distinguish ourselves within our field as innovators of new concepts and techniques by providing comprehensive, award-winning communications and community outreach services to public agencies, municipalities, nonprofit and civic organizations throughout the nine-county Bay Area. We deliver sharp strategies and pointed solutions for our clients and the community that go beyond the norm and remain on the cutting edge.

Serving the Civic Sphere

We take pride in our nuanced understanding of the communities in which we live and work and our creative approach to engaging stakeholders – from elected officials and neighborhood advocates to youth and the press. Our team has supported communications and public engagement campaigns touching a wide variety of issue areas including transportation and other infrastructure, economic development, construction mitigation, police reform, budget processes, public health, taxation, and bond measures, among others. On behalf of our clients, we provide a variety of services including identity development, messaging, social media campaigns, media relations and media training, collateral development, online stakeholder engagement, newsletter production, meeting facilitation, project ambassador training and deployment, public workshop planning, and more.

Our Ethos

Tell the good story about our clients’ important work

Find new and improved ways to cultivate important community dialogues with the public agencies and organizations we serve

Empower underrepresented communities to act

Consistently offer excellent client services

Responsive Public Relations

From creating messaging campaigns that educate and engage to building diverse coalitions, Civic Edge Consulting knows how to reach diverse groups of people. We understand that no two audiences are alike and we have experience designing comprehensive communications and outreach strategies that strike the right chords at the right time.

We use innovative means to connect with those who are traditionally less engaged in public conversations and have successfully executed such strategies throughout the region.

Authentic Community Engagement

It’s hard to move even the brightest of ideas forward without stakeholder support and community buy in. Understanding the complexities and nuances of the communities at stake in our region is a complicated process, and we’re here to help navigate.

We’ve attained a hard-earned reputation as experts in the field of community outreach and engagement in the complex Bay Area. We are experts in creating multi-faceted communications and outreach campaigns that utilize face-to-face communication, neighborhood walks, multilingual and culturally sensitive collateral material, social media, multi-media, graphic design, and more–and we never use a cookie cutter approach.

We help develop messages, materials, and educational programs to make sure that our team is authentically grassroots, not artificial turf. And then we run the complicated process of making sure the voices of the community and our clients are heard at the right time by the right people.

Innovative Strategic Communications

If a tree falls in the forest, can you get anyone to blog about it? We’ve helped get the word out about projects big and small, about construction and climate change, about buses and bike lanes, about projects right around the corner and projects farther down the road. (And not just to bloggers, no.) We’re a boutique media shop, and every one of our press releases is hand‐crafted and carefully targeted to maximize interest and minimize waste.

We garner media attention for the brilliant work of our clients: including the testing of autonomous vehicles in the national press, and community championed initiatives like Vision Zero in the local press.